


Mouse King

by Keiko Kirin (sakana17)



Category: NCIS: Los Angeles
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-19
Updated: 2009-12-19
Packaged: 2017-10-04 14:55:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/31484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sakana17/pseuds/Keiko%20Kirin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>G works to decipher what's either a clue or an elaborate hoax.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mouse King

**Author's Note:**

  * For [metaphoracle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/metaphoracle/gifts).



Dirt and gravel crunched under the wheels of the black Dodge Challenger and dry ochre earth pelted the windows. Sam stared straight ahead, hands gripped on the steering wheel, and G waited for him to break the last twenty minutes of silence.

A few more minutes passed as the car bounced and bucked across the deserted grove before Sam said, "You get to explain to Hetty about the expense for the car wash."

G relaxed a little. "Just run the windshield wiper a few times. You can see well enough to get us back." He smiled and glanced at Sam.

Sam shook his head once. "Return the car in this state to Hetty?" he said. "Don't even joke about it. Seriously."

"Seriously?" G's eyebrow twitched.

"Seriously."

G scanned the view beyond the smears of dirt on the windshield. A dark shape on the track ahead caught his attention.

"Stop. That's it," he said, and Sam braked. They sat and watched for movement from the dying citrus trees lining the track.

Sam glanced at G. "You want to sit here all day?"

G opened the door cautiously, looking around, sliding his gun from the glove compartment. Hot, dusty noonday sunlight blazed overhead and crows strutted between the trees. Gun raised and ready, G scanned the area again before crouching and slowly lifting what was either a clue or an elaborate, time-wasting hoax.

\-----

"A nutcracker?" Nate repeated, one eyebrow cocked.

"A nutcracker," Sam said, settling into a chair and picking up a newspaper. G didn't miss the look of exasperation Sam gave him before disappearing behind today's headlines.

Nate turned to G. "The metal kind?" He made a squeezing motion with his hand. "Or one like the-- Oh," he said as G shook his head.

Hetty joined them, carrying the wooden nutcracker. She set it upright on the table, saying, "The lab found no explosives, biochemical agents, toxins, or residue of any sort. Mr. Callen, this is all yours." G met her unwavering gaze and could tell her patience was wearing thin but wasn't yet at the breaking point. He nodded at her: message received and understood. Hetty patted his arm and returned to her inner sanctum.

Nate slid into a chair across the table from G, staring at the nutcracker. He glanced at G sharply. "Mean anything to you?"

G frowned at the nutcracker. "No." He picked it up and turned it around in his hands, searching for answers. It was an ordinary, rather ugly wooden nutcracker in the form of a soldier. Its legs were painted black, its coat and cap painted red, and its hair and beard were white. Two round black eyes stared out above a hooked nose.

From behind the newspaper, Sam said, "You ever think maybe this guy Hartmut is screwing with you?"

"Constantly," G said with a frustrated sigh. "But he's given me good intel in the past."

"And some crap intel, too, the way I heard it," Sam said, lowering the newspaper.

G glanced at him. "Yeah," he conceded. "And some crap intel. Hartmut likes games."

"He thinks he's smarter than everyone else," Nate suggested. "It's important to him to have the upper hand. Keeps information back or deliberately shares disinformation when it suits him."

G nodded. "Yeah, that's Hartmut."

Nate leaned closer, giving G an intent look G met head-on. "But somehow he's earned your trust. At least, enough trust that you went out to retrieve this without knowing what it was and whether it would be useful or not." Nate paused and sat back. "Interesting."

G felt Sam's gaze in the pause while he waited for Nate to ask the obvious question -- _why?_ \-- and he shifted his attention back to the nutcracker. Nate didn't ask, but G answered anyway.

"I don't know why, to be honest," G said. "Hartmut's former Stasi."

Nate frowned. "East German secret police?"

"Yeah," G said uncomfortably. "He went to ground in Yugoslavia after the Berlin Wall fell, and I met him in Serbia. He's brilliant, knows a dozen different languages -- that's how we found him: we needed a translator -- but he's arrogant and always has his own agenda."

"Dangerous," Sam said.

G thought about it. "Dangerous, yeah, but not threatening. He's never been a threat to me." G smiled a little. "In fact, he's always saying he likes me."

Sam raised an eyebrow. "Really? There something you need to tell us?" His lips twitched.

G grinned at him. "Aw, do I really need to tell you that I only have eyes for you?"

Sam rolled his eyes and Nate cleared his throat. The pause was broken by Eric whistling for their attention from the second floor balcony. Sam and Nate rose and headed for the stairs. G picked up the nutcracker and followed them.

Eric barely waited for them to enter his high-tech lair before announcing, "I traced the e-mail from Hartmut. There were so many pings and hops on this thing, and it required crossing a few borders that didn't want to be crossed." He beamed with pride.

Sam folded his arms over his chest. "And?" he prompted.

"Switzerland," Eric said, tapping on a computer tablet. A satellite image of a large urban area opened on the wall display. "Zurich, to be exact."

G set the nutcracker down and walked over to the display. "Can you get more exact?"

Eric grimaced a little. "Working on it." He looked at the nutcracker curiously. "This it?"

G nodded absently. He paced in front of the display, staring at the satellite image of Zurich as if answers would miraculously appear on the roofs of the tiny buildings.

"Nutcracker," Eric mused. "Popularly known from the Tschaikovsky ballet based on a story by E.T.A. Hoffmann. Creepy uncle gives Clara -- in some versions, Maria -- a wooden nutcracker at Christmas. Nutcracker comes alive, kills the Mouse King, and he and Clara -- or Maria -- go off on adventures together."

G, Sam, and Nate stared at Eric for a moment.

"Ballet?" Sam said dryly.

Nate pointedly gave Eric's bright beach shirt and baggy shorts a once-over. "You know the plot of _The Nutcracker_?"

Eric smirked. "Wikipedia is my friend."

G's thoughts were racing, bouncing between Serbia, Hartmut, and here. He looked at the display again. "What did you say about the Mouse King?"

"Uhh, the Nutcracker comes alive and slays the Mouse King for Clara. Or Maria," Eric answered, clearly wondering why G was interested.

G's thoughts were still bouncing and not landing anywhere. Frustrated, G turned away from the display. "Get me the exact location in Zurich," he told Eric as he left the room.

Kensi was working out at the punching bag, high-kicking the hell out of it, and Dom was getting the full Hetty treatment over his surveillance notes from their previous job, so G ended up outside in the courtyard, sitting on a step. He figured Sam would give him at least ten minutes to think it out; it was more like five.

"Mother hen," G said ruefully, glancing back as Sam closed the door behind him.

"You gonna be like that, I'll let Nate come out here instead."

G shook his head and scooted over on the step to make room for Sam. Sam sat down and rested his forearms on his knees. "Tell me about it, G."

G ran his hands over his hair. "We had a nickname for Hartmut: King of the Rats. Because of the way he was. A little shifty. And because he told us a story about when he was Stasi. How once, on a bet, he'd caught all the rats in the basement where they held prisoners and had made a stew. His men served it to the prisoners and laughed about how it was the best meal they'd ever get. But what they didn't know, Hartmut told us, was that he'd released the rats in a park and made the stew from pork scraps."

"And you believed him?" Sam asked.

G shrugged. "That's Hartmut. It's the kind of thing he might do, or the kind of thing he might lie about."

Sam nodded slightly, gaze fixed on the empty courtyard. "No joke this time. Was there something with this guy I should know about?"

G knew what Sam meant and smiled a little. "No. Hartmut's gotta be older than Hetty. Honestly, that's not what it was."

Sam nodded again. "Older than Hetty, huh? You know what Nate would say."

G tensed a little. He'd heard it all before. Not from Nate, and he hoped it never would be from Nate because he was tired of trying to explain how the _last_ thing he was looking for was a father figure. But in G's experience, people from ordinary families viewed everything through their lens of ordinariness.

"So it's not that, either," Sam said, looking at him. "What are you thinking?"

"The Nutcracker killed the Mouse King," G said.

"Mouse King, King of the Rats. You think Hartmut's dead?"

G rubbed his forehead. "I don't know. Maybe. It's his kind of message, but maybe it wasn't from him."

"And if it's not, it's from someone who knew him and you well enough to send this message." Sam clenched his jaw. "And that could be a problem."

"That could be a big problem," G agreed, thoughts racing back to Serbia again.

Behind them the door opened and Dom peeked out, looking nervous about interrupting them. "Um. Eric has something." He disappeared behind the door.

Sam stood up. "Eric's got a messenger service now?"

G grinned at him. "Beats whistling."

\-----

Before G could ask, Eric told him the bad news first: no luck pinpointing the location in Zurich.

"But," Eric said with a cocky grin, "I think you'll like this." He tapped on his tablet and another satellite image filled the display, this one of familiar dry California countryside: brown hills and scrubby trees.

"I've had a crawler going through satellites with the coordinates for where you found the nutcracker," he explained. "And we got lucky." A few more taps, and the image zoomed in to show a person in a grove bending over. Eric circled the timestamp. "This is who left it there."

G examined the image carefully. "More detail?"

Eric shook his head. "Sorry. It's from an older commercial satellite, and the angle on the person doesn't get better than this. But--"

"Wait," G cut him off, walking up to the display until he was right in front of the person. He glanced at Sam, one eyebrow raised.

Sam nodded at him. "Yep."

Eric's eyes darted from Sam to G. "What?"

"It's a woman," G told him. And now it was more of a mystery than before, but G's instincts told him they were finally getting somewhere. "Go on," he instructed Eric.

Eric grinned again. "It gets better." He brought up a new image from the same area and zoomed in on a vehicle parked by the grove. From overhead, it looked like a blue truck or SUV. "This was the only vehicle in the area at the same time. I ran it through our make and model database, and it's a 2007 Toyota Tacoma."

"There's gotta be a lot of those around," Sam said.

Eric hurriedly tapped on the tablet, and a series of new images dotted the display. "Probably. But only one was caught on a traffic camera this morning at the last four-way stop on the only road leading to this abandoned grove." He zoomed one of the traffic camera images.

"License plate," Sam said with satisfaction.

A California driver's license now filled the display, and G hurriedly scanned the name and address before taking a long look at the driver's photograph.

\-----

The apartment building was generic postwar Californian with cream stucco walls, a carport below and apartments above. As G and Sam walked across the driveway to the stairs, they saw the blue Tacoma parked in the carport and shared a look. G glanced around at the characterless building and its twin in beige next door. He'd lived in a couple of places like this, never for very long.

The driver's license had been a man's: Manuel Hernandez, thirty-two years old, native Angeleno, no criminal record and no connections to Serbia, East Germany, Switzerland, or anything else. G's gut feeling that they were close to solving the puzzle wavered a little as he and Sam climbed the stairs, but this was the only solid lead they had.

He knocked on the apartment door. Sam murmured, "Census takers again?"

G smiled. "I was thinking we could be the new couple who just moved in next door, but..." He paused to look around the tired, nondescript apartment building. "...I don't think this place would go with our image."

Sam arched an eyebrow, but whatever retort he was going to make was cut off by the door opening. An attractive, dark-haired woman in her thirties stood in the doorway.

"Yes?" she said, looking at them questioningly.

Sam was waiting for G's lead, but G was quiet for a moment as he stared at the woman. One piece of the puzzle slid into place.

"You're Hartmut's daughter," he said, and saw the answer in her eyes as she stared back.

After a hesitation, she said, "You're Mr. Callen, aren't you? I'm Ulrike Hernandez. You'd better come inside."

\-----

The interior of the apartment was only slightly less nondescript than the exterior: some Ikea furniture that had seen better days, a small bookcase lined with secondhand mystery novels, and a couple of framed snapshots of the beach on the wall. In one of them, Ulrike Hernandez shaded her eyes and smiled at the camera.

Ulrike offered them coffee and sat down in the sole chair when they declined. G and Sam sat on the futon sofa, which creaked with age under their weight. Manuel Hernandez briefly appeared in the passage to the kitchen, retreating wordlessly when she slowly shook her head and told him, "It's about Father."

"Your husband?" Sam asked, nodding toward the kitchen.

"Yes." She looked at them again. Reluctant to talk, but not nervous, G noted. He sat more comfortably on the sofa to appear more at ease and said casually, "I never knew Hartmut had any family."

She relaxed slightly. "I wasn't close to my father when I was growing up. After my mother died, he sent me to live with my grandparents in Cottbus. I'd see him once or twice a year. I didn't know much about him, didn't know what he did, until I was an adult." She looked away. "And then I saw even less of him until a few years ago."

G sat forward. He was certain now, but needed the confirmation. "Hartmut's dead, isn't he?"

Ulrike nodded, a distant look in her eyes. "Cancer. He fought it for over a year, but..."

"Was he in Zurich?" G asked.

She seemed surprised that he knew about Zurich, and G wondered how much Hartmut had told her about him or his job.

"He retired there. I don't know how, don't know where he found the money and the connections." Ulrike smiled sadly. "He was like that."

"Yes, he was," G said quietly.

"I'm sorry about your loss," Sam put in, "but can you explain why we had to run around in the dirt to find a nutcracker when you could've just sent us an obituary?" G glanced at him sharply, but Sam kept his focus on Ulrike.

Ulrike didn't shrink from Sam's gaze, and G respected her for it. She said, "That was my father's idea. He left me specific instructions, and I followed them. He said Mr. Callen would know what it meant." She shrugged a little. "It's hard to explain. I grew up not truly knowing him, then after he retired, he found me and we reconnected. I should've hated him, but after all, I'm his daughter." She met G's eyes and smiled. "My father liked his games."

G couldn't quite return the smile. "Yeah," he said with a sigh. "He did." He stood up, saying, "Thank you for seeing us, for letting me know. I really am sorry."

Ulrike rose to open the door for them. Sam was slower to leave, pausing in the doorway to say to her, "Quite a coincidence, though. You ending up in LA where you could leave that clue for Callen."

Ulrike seemed amused by his suspicion. "Not really. My father talked a lot about California after he retired. He told me he'd met someone from Los Angeles, and he wanted to see the place. Next thing I know, he'd bought me a ticket. I came here for a holiday, met Manuel, and, well, here I am."

After she closed the door behind them, Sam gave G a hard look. "You told Hartmut you were from Los Angeles?"

"Nope. Never."

"I know," Sam said with a little shake of his head. "That's the kind of guy he was."

"Yep."

\-----

On the way back to the NCIS operations center, Eric called with information they already knew: Manuel Hernandez's wife was an East German by birth, had come to America seven years ago. G informed him that the mystery was solved.

G recognized the silence in the car, and after a while said, "I can't explain it. It's not like he was a friend, but..."

"But you knew him," Sam offered. "Serbia. Tough times, I'm guessing."

G watched the landscape of apartment blocks, fast-food restaurants, and muffler shops passing by. "Some tough times, yeah."

"Yeah."

G paused. "You know how sometimes, there's just this guy, and you can't really figure him out. Maybe you can't trust him, but you do anyway. He raises more questions than he answers, but in the end you realize he's helped you more than you thought. Someone you're never sure about, but when he comes to you, you end up listening."

"Yeah, I know a guy like that," Sam said deliberately.

G turned to stare at him. "Me? You are not talking about me. I am completely trustworthy."

Sam's lips twitched.

"When have I not been trustworthy? I'm hurt you'd suggest it, even if you're just kidding."

"Who said I was kidding?" Sam's eyes darted to G. "Oh, now you're going to pout?"

"I do not pout," G said, folding his arms over his chest.

"Looking a little pouty to me." Sam smiled.

G narrowed his eyes. "That's right, keep joking, Hanna. Then see who's left explaining the car wash charge from this morning to Hetty."

Sam's smile vanished. "You wouldn't."

G pointedly looked out the window. "I don't know. I'm liable to do anything when I'm pouty. Since I'm so untrustworthy."

"I take it back. You are the most trustworthy person I know," Sam said solemnly.

G leaned back comfortably in the seat and smiled. "That's more like it." He caught Sam's answering smile.

Outside, the urban sprawl became less dense, more accessorized with palm trees, and the sky glowed smoggy, pre-sunset orange. G reflected briefly on the past: memories to put away for now, questions for which he might never find answers. And there wasn't much point dwelling on the future until it happened. That left the present, and the present, G thought, glancing at Sam, was good enough. The present was, in fact, just fine.

(the end)


End file.
